EMERGENCIAS

As a reflection of present-day reality, contemporary art seeks to place emphasis on the surrounding reality. Therefore, a museum presently needs to create a political and social commitment through different projects that generate a collective consciousness which, although utopian, reflects on our present.

Emergencies offers an extensive collective exhibition consisting of works that belong to the MUSAC Collection. Under this epilogue the exhibition attempts to make the spectator think about urgent problems in our society: from destruction of the environment to armed conflicts, pandemics, etc.

The exhibition, which will occupy the entire exhibition area in the new museum, will display works that reflect the different problems arising from and originating in the environment, different types of discrimination and inequality; points in conflict, occupation of space, migratory movements, the alienation of the individual, different cultural emergencies, new social structures and Africa, the name of the continent which in itself has become an “emergency”. The work by Alfredo Jaar, Emergency, which the exhibition is based on, acts as a metaphor that comprises all of the previous works and one of the most important lines in the collection.

This exhibition seeks to increase the spectator's awareness of the critical needs in our world. Thus, it actively considers open questions that we may have overlooked, immersed in a society of well-being where we are incapable of discerning between a media image that shows hunger in Africa and a perfume advertisement. At this point, one loses sight of the thin line that separates what is supposedly the First and the Third World.

However, Emergencies is not only an exhibition. At this time, an initial bookcatalogue will also be published that includes the images in the exhibition and basic general information as well as critical texts which offer an overall view of what is occurring around us, aware that not all of the “emergencies” on the planet are reflected here. As a result, one can come to understand not only a collection of contemporary art, but also the critical situations in the world, which are expressed by artistic creations. Apart from the documentary and research material, it will also include texts by the artists themselves that seek to propose solutions to the adversities surrounding us, as wells as utopian contributions to a better future. Later on, another book will be published that includes the record of all activities related to Emergencies conducted during the four months of the exhibition.

Emergencies, therefore, is considered from a hopeful, utopian perspective, based on a radically committed and distinctive proposal for exhibiting a Collection.

Collection Vol. I Conceived with a clear vocation to become a museum of the present, the MUSAC undertakes the first step in its collection with a selection of the most important creative references that have emerged during the past decade. Through over 700 works by 153 artists from the regional, national and international spheres, the characteristics of this collection enable it to present itself as an essential reference point for understanding the art developed during the past ten years, as well as for predicting the possible course art will take in the coming years.

This first volume of the collection is the first of the five volumes planned to come into being gradually every two years, up until 2012.

The wide variety of artistic concerns and contemporary proposals sets up an extensive creative network which, on occasions, we approach with the fear that the unknown provokes in us. Far from attempting a reductionist system of classification that resolves this lack of stylistic and conceptual definitions, the presentation of the collection is divided into six sections that are open to subjective interpretation. These sections do not seek to be more than mere guides that allow the spectator to penetrate into the complex network of contemporary creation, which this selection is simply one example of. The inclusion of works in a particular section is not incompatible with their participation in others, nor with the free and subjective interpretations that each spectator may have of the collection based on his or her own perspective.

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Opening Project:
EMERGENCIAS

mit Eija-Liisa Ahtila, Pilar Albarracin, Alexander Apostol, Shoja Azari, Sergio Belinchon, Mira Bernabeu, Marc Bijl, Daniele Buetti, Mujeres Creando, Luc Delahaye, Olafur Eliasson, Sandra Gamarra, Carmela Garcia, Cristina Garcia Rodero, Kirsten Geisler, Ruth Gomez, Pierre Gonnord, Paul Graham, Andreas Gursky, Chus Gutiérrez, Thomas Hirschhorn, Alfredo Jaar, Francesco Jodice, Isaac Julien, Immo Klink, Valeriano Lopez, Rogelio Lopez Cuenca, Jorge Macchi, Inigo Manglano-Ovalle, Gilda Mantilla, Angel Marcos, Enrique Marty, Boris Mikhailov, Tracey Moffatt, Julia Montilla & Juande Jarillo, Zwelethu Mthethwa, Multiplicity , Marina Nunez, Tony Oursler, Sven Pahlsson, El Perro, Jorge Pineda, Marjetica Potrc, Simeon Saiz, Anri Sala, Pepo Salazar, Fernando Sanchez Castillo, Martin Sastre, Corinna Schnitt, Allan Sekula, Yinka Shonibare, Trine Sondergaard, Superflex , Joana Vasconcelos